The Australian opera Voss, by composer Richard Meale and writer David Malouf, is to return to Adelaide, the city where it was first performed.

Based on Patrick White’s novel about the explorer Ludwig Leichhardt, who disappeared whilst on expedition in outback Australia around 1845, the opera premiered at the Adelaide Festival of Arts in 1986. In 2021, State Opera South Australia and Victorian Opera will co-produce one-off semi-staged concerts in both Melbourne and Adelaide.

Revived for the first time in 30 years, the production will be directed by SOSA Artistic Director Stuart Maunder and will feature an all-Australian cast led by Samuel Dundas as Johann Ulrich Voss and Emma Pearson as Laura Trevelyan. For the Adelaide performance, the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra will be conducted by VO Artistic Director Richard Mills.

“On the surface Voss is a tale of one man versus nature and his own nature. What lies beneath is an exquisite and moving exploration of the Outsider; a man who desperately seeks an elusive personal connection, and an...